War crimes in the Kosovo War - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The War crimes in the Kosovo War were a series of war crimes committed during the Kosovo War

Kosovo War

The term Kosovo War or Kosovo conflict was two sequential, and at times parallel, armed conflicts in Kosovo province, then part of FR Yugoslav Republic of Serbia; from early 1998 to 1999, there was an armed conflict initiated by the ethnic Albanian "Kosovo Liberation Army" , who sought independence...

(early 1998 – 11 June 1999). Yugoslav security forces invaded Kosovo and killed many Albanian civilians; there were also attacks on on Yugoslav security forces and moderate Albanians by the Kosovo Liberation Army

Kosovo Liberation Army

The Kosovo Liberation Army or KLA was a Kosovar Albanian paramilitary organization which sought the separation of Kosovo from Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in the 1990s....

. According to Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...

, the list of the major war crimes also includes abuses committed by the Kosovo Liberation Army, such as kidnappings and summary executions, but "the vast majority of the violations over the past year (January 1998 – April 1999) are attributable to the Serbian police or Yugoslav Army".

In Serbia

Serbia

Serbia , officially the Republic of Serbia , is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe, covering the southern part of the Carpathian basin and the central part of the Balkans...

, Serb policemen who fought Albanian militants in Kosovo are still revered by many as war hero

Hero

A hero , in Greek mythology and folklore, was originally a demigod, their cult being one of the most distinctive features of ancient Greek religion...

es, while in Kosovo some of the internationally recognized terrorists were awarded "Hero of Kosovo" title.

Background

Kosovo Albanians constitute a majority of Kosovo

Kosovo

Kosovo is a region in southeastern Europe. Part of the Ottoman Empire for more than five centuries, later the Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija within Serbia...

population. During the 1970s and 1980s, hundreds of Serbs

Serbs

The Serbs are a South Slavic ethnic group of the Balkans and southern Central Europe. Serbs are located mainly in Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and form a sizable minority in Croatia, the Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia. Likewise, Serbs are an officially recognized minority in...

and Montenegrins left Kosovo, largely due to economic situation and pressures by the Kosovo Albanian government and population. "57,000 Serbs have left Kosovo in the last decade" due to murder, rape

Rape

Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...

and persecution

Persecution

Persecution is the systematic mistreatment of an individual or group by another group. The most common forms are religious persecution, ethnic persecution, and political persecution, though there is naturally some overlap between these terms. The inflicting of suffering, harassment, isolation,...

– wrote the New York Times in 1982. Slobodan Milošević

Slobodan Milošević

Slobodan Milošević was President of Serbia and Yugoslavia. He served as the President of Socialist Republic of Serbia and Republic of Serbia from 1989 until 1997 in three terms and as President of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from 1997 to 2000...

gained great power by pledging to discontinue this repression.

Milošević abolished Kosovo's autonomy

Anti-bureaucratic revolution

Anti-bureaucratic revolution as a term, refers to a series of mass protests against governments of Yugoslavian republics and autonomous provinces during 1988 and 1989, which led to resignations of leaderships of Kosovo, Vojvodina and Montenegro, and the capture of power by politicians close to...

in 1989. With his rise, the Albanians started boycotting state institutions and ignoring the laws of the Republic of Serbia. Serbia tried to maintain its political control over the province. With the formation of the Kosovo Liberation Army, a large number of the Kosovo Albanians became radicalized. Serbian military response was brutal. In 1997 international sanctions

International sanctions

International sanctions are actions taken by countries against others for political reasons, either unilaterally or multilaterally.There are several types of sanctions....

were applied to Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, because of persecution of Albanians from Kosovo.

KLA war crimes

Kidnappings and summary executions

In some villages under KLA control in 1998, the rebels drove ethnic Serbs from their homes. Some of those who remained are unaccounted for and are presumed to have been abducted by the KLA and killed. The KLA detained an estimated 85 Serbs during its 19 July 1998, attack on Orahovac

Orahovac

Orahovac is a town and municipality in western Kosovo, in the District of Đakovica.-Name:Its Serbian name stems from the Serbian word orah , meaning "walnut"....

. 35 of these people were subsequently released but the others remain. On 22 July 1998, the KLA briefly took control of the Belacevac mine near Obilic. Nine Serbs were captured that day, and they remain on the ICRC's list of the missing. In August 1998, 22 Serbian civilians were reportedly killed in the village of Klečka, where the police claimed to have discovered human remains and a kiln used to cremate the bodies. In September 1998, the Serbian police collected 34 bodies of people believed to have been seized and murdered by the KLA, among them some ethnic Albanians, at Lake Radonjic near Glodjane (Gllogjan).

According to the International Committee of the Red Cross and Hague Tribunal

International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

The International Tribunal for the Prosecution of Persons Responsible for Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law Committed in the Territory of the Former Yugoslavia since 1991, more commonly referred to as the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia or ICTY, is a...

information, 97 Kosovo Serbs were kidnapped in 1998. According to a Serbian government report, from 1 January 1998 to 10 June 1999 the KLA killed 988 people and kidnapped 287; of those killed, 335 were civilians, 351 were soldiers, 230 were police and 72 were unidentified; by nationality, 87 of killed civilians were Serbs, 230 Albanians, and 18 of other nationalities.

Massacres

Incomplete list of massacres:

Gnjilane massacre – 80 Serbs discovered in mass graves having been killed by Albanians.
Orahovac Massacre - More then 100 Serbian and Roma civilians kidnapped and placed in concentration camps, 47 were killed.
Staro Gracko massacre – 14 Serbian farmers murdered by the KLA.
Glodjane massacre – 37 Serbs found in mass graves having been massacred by the KLA.
Klecka massacre – 22 Serbs raped, murdered and mutilated by the KLA.
Ugljare massacre – 15 Serbs murdered by KLA separatists.
Pec massacre – 20 Serbs murdered and their corpses thrown down wells. Ramush Hardinaj is currently on trial for this, amongst other crimes.
Panda Bar massacre
Panda Bar Massacre
The Panda Bar incident was a terrorist attack against Kosovo Serb teenagers in the City of Peć in north-western Kosovo.On 14 December 1998, during the Kosovo war, unidentified gunmen attacked Panda Bar caffe in Peć...

in 1998 – 6 Kosovo Serb teenagers were killed.

Destruction of settlements, churches and cemeteries

In the days after Yugoslav forces withdrew from Kosovo, over 200,000 homes were demolished by ethnic Albanians along with the KLA.

Since the war ended many Serbian grave sites have been desecrated by ethnic Albanians. No one has since received any punishment for these crimes.

During and after the Kosovo conflict (Continuing to this day) hundreds of Serbian Orthodox churches have been destroyed at the hands of Albanian separatists.

Ethnic cleansing

During the Kosovo war over 90,000 Serbian and other Non Albanian refugees fled the embattled province. In the days after the Yugoslav troops withdrew, over 200,000 non Albanian refugees were forced from the province by Ethnic Albanians.

In 2000, the German war photographer

War Photographer

War Photographer is a documentary by Christian Frei about the photographer James Nachtwey. As well as telling the story of an iconic man in the field of war photography, the film addresses the broader scope of ideas common to all those involved in war journalism, as well as the issues that they...

Frauke Eigen

Frauke Eigen is a German photographer, photojournalist and artist.-Kosovo war photographs:Eigen is featured in the Imperial War Museum London's 2011-2012 Women War Artists exhibition for her 2000 photographic exhibition Fundstücke Kosovo about war crimes in Kosovo...

created an exhibition about the clothing and belongings of the victims of ethnic cleansing

Ethnic cleansing

Ethnic cleansing is a purposeful policy designed by one ethnic or religious group to remove by violent and terror-inspiring means the civilian population of another ethnic orreligious group from certain geographic areas....

in the Kosovo war. Eigen's photographs were taken onsite during the exhumation of mass graves, and were later used as evidence by the War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague

The Hague

The Hague is the capital city of the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. With a population of 500,000 inhabitants , it is the third largest city of the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam...

Use of child soldiers

Around 10% of all KLA fighters engaged within the conflict were under the age of 18, with some being as young as 13.

Concentration camps

Lapušnik prison camp
Llapushnik prison camp
Lapušnik or Llapushnik prison camp was a detention camp near the city of Glogovac in central Kosovo during the Kosovo war, early 1998, held by the Kosovo Liberation Army for the intimidation, imprisonment, violence and murder of Serbs and perceived Albanian collaborators who refused to cooperate...

– A KLA concentration camp in Glogovac where 23 Serbian civilians were allegedly killed, more of 200 still missing, Hardina Bala; A KLA prison guard was found guilty of torture, ill treatment of prisoners and murder for crimes committed at the camp.

Concentration Camps in Albania – Many Non Albanian and Albanian loyalists were kidnapped by the KLA and taken across the border into Albania we're they were held, interrogated, tortured and in most cases killed, several investigations into these camps have led to evidence detailing that several prisoners had their organs removed.

Organ theft

During and after the 1999 war it was alleged that several Serb, Albanian loyalist and Roma prisoners who were taken across the border into Kosovo were killed in a "Yellow House" near the town of Burrel and had several of their organs removed for sale on the black market. These claims were investigated first by the ICTY who found medical equipment and traces of blood in and around the house, they were then investigated by the UN, who received witness reports from many ex-KLA fighters who stated that several of the prisoners had their organs removed. Chief Prosecutor for the ICTY; Carla Del Ponte revealed these crimes to the public in her book; Madame Prosecutor in 2008, causing a large response. In 2011; French media outlet; France24 released a classified UN document written in 2003 which documented the crimes.

In late 2010 a Council of Europe report by the Swiss politician; Dick Marty, who had previously gained fame for exposing CIA prison camps within Europe implicated current Kosovo prime minister; Hashim Thaci in a mafia ring named the Drenica group who had, among other crimes, taken hundreds of Serb, Roma and Albanian loyalist prisoners into Albania. The healthiest prisoners were taken to operating clinics near Tirana where they were killed by a shot into the head and had their kidneys removed, which were then sent to Istanbul for sale.

The release of the documents triggered international outrage and spawned an investigation by EULEX into the trafficking, this was criticized by Marty who believed that an independent organisation rather than EULEX should look into the crimes. EULEX asked Dick Marty for evidence, most of which was in the form of witness statements, Marty refused to do so until a credible witness protection system was set up to ensure that those who deliver evidence are not the victims of revenge attacks by the KLA. Marty revealed that the Albanian authorities had attempted to prevent any investigation into Organ trafficking. Hashim Thaci has denied any crimes took place.

Yugoslav war crimes

Persecution and deportations

During the armed conflict in 1998 Yugoslav Army

Yugoslav Army

Aside from the Yugoslav People's Army, the terms Yugoslav Army, Army of Yugoslavia, or Military of Yugoslavia may refer to:* Yugoslav Partisans , the Yugoslav resistance army during World War II...

and Serbian police allegedly used excessive and random force, which resulted in property damage, displacement of population and death of civilians. Some claim that Belgrade

Belgrade

Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, where the Pannonian Plain meets the Balkans. According to official results of Census 2011, the city has a population of 1,639,121. It is one of the 15 largest cities in Europe...

unleashed Operation Horseshoe

Operation Horseshoe

Operation Horseshoe is a name attributed to a large-scale antiterrorism campaign which during the NATO bombing escalated to ethnic cleansing of Kosovo Albanians carried out by Serbian Police and Yugoslav Army during the Kosovo War....

in the summer of 1998, when hundreds of thousands of Kosovar Albanians were driven from their home

Home

A home is a place of residence or refuge. When it refers to a building, it is usually a place in which an individual or a family can rest and store personal property. Most modern-day households contain sanitary facilities and a means of preparing food. Animals have their own homes as well, either...

s (Though this is highly controversial, with many scholars dismissing Operation horseshoe as propaganda).

Withdrawal of OSCE monitors on 20 March 1999, together with the start of NATO's bombing campaign, allegedly encouraged Milosevic to implement "the campaign of expulsions". With the beginning of NATO bombing of Yugoslavia this was supposedly implemented, though the Yugoslav government maintains that the refugee crisis was caused by the bombings. The Yugoslav Army

Yugoslav Army

Aside from the Yugoslav People's Army, the terms Yugoslav Army, Army of Yugoslavia, or Military of Yugoslavia may refer to:* Yugoslav Partisans , the Yugoslav resistance army during World War II...

, Serbian police and Serb paramilitary

Serb paramilitary

- Before World War II :* Komitadji* Chetniks* Narodna Odbrana, reported to have committed war crimes in Macedonia.- Yugoslav war :* Serbian Guard* White Eagles, also known as Šešeljevci, reported for ethnic cleansing in Bosnia, Vojvodina and Kosovo....

in spring 1999, in an alleged organized manner, with supposed significant use of state resources were accused of conducting a broad campaign of violence against Albanian civilians to expel them from Kosovo

Kosovo

Kosovo is a region in southeastern Europe. Part of the Ottoman Empire for more than five centuries, later the Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija within Serbia...

and thus maintain political control of Belgrade

Belgrade

over the province. S
According to the legally binding verdict of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

, Federal Army and Serbian police after the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia

1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia

The NATO bombing of Yugoslavia was NATO's military operation against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia during the Kosovo War. The strikes lasted from March 24, 1999 to June 10, 1999...

24 March 1999, allegedly systematically attacked villages with Albanian population, abuse

Abuse

Abuse is the improper usage or treatment for a bad purpose, often to unfairly or improperly gain benefit. Abuse can come in many forms, such as: physical or verbal maltreatment, injury, sexual assault, violation, rape, unjust practices; wrongful practice or custom; offense; crime, or otherwise...

d, robbed

Robbery

Robbery is the crime of taking or attempting to take something of value by force or threat of force or by putting the victim in fear. At common law, robbery is defined as taking the property of another, with the intent to permanently deprive the person of that property, by means of force or fear....

and killed civilians, ordering them to go to Albania

Albania

Albania , officially known as the Republic of Albania , is a country in Southeastern Europe, in the Balkans region. It is bordered by Montenegro to the northwest, Kosovo to the northeast, the Republic of Macedonia to the east and Greece to the south and southeast. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea...

or Montenegro

Montenegro

Montenegro Montenegrin: Crna Gora Црна Гора , meaning "Black Mountain") is a country located in Southeastern Europe. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea to the south-west and is bordered by Croatia to the west, Bosnia and Herzegovina to the northwest, Serbia to the northeast and Albania to the...

, burning their houses and destroying by their property

Property

Property is any physical or intangible entity that is owned by a person or jointly by a group of people or a legal entity like a corporation...

. Nemanja Stjepanović claimed that within the campaign of violence

Violence

Violence is the use of physical force to apply a state to others contrary to their wishes. violence, while often a stand-alone issue, is often the culmination of other kinds of conflict, e.g...

, Albanians were mass expelled from their homes, murdered, sexually assaulted

Sexual assault

Sexual assault is an assault of a sexual nature on another person, or any sexual act committed without consent. Although sexual assaults most frequently are by a man on a woman, it may involve any combination of two or more men, women and children....

, and their religious buildings destroyed. Serbian forces committed numerous war crimes during the implementation of "joint criminal enterprise

Joint Criminal Enterprise

Joint criminal enterprise ' is a legal doctrine used by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia to prosecute political and military leaders for mass war crimes, including genocide, committed during the Yugoslav wars 1991-1999....

" whose aim was to "through the use of violence and terror, force a significant number of Kosovo Albanians to leave their homes, across the border, the state government to retain control over Kosovo." Ethnic cleansing

Ethnic cleansing

of the Albanian population is performed by the following model: first the army surrounded a place, then followed the shelling, then the police entered the village, and often with them and the army, and then crimes occurs (murders, rapes, beatings, expulsions...).

According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees , also known as The UN Refugee Agency is a United Nations agency mandated to protect and support refugees at the request of a government or the UN itself and assists in their voluntary repatriation, local integration or resettlement to...

, by June 1999, the Yugoslav military, Serbian police and paramilitaries expelled 862,979 Albanians from Kosovo, and several hundred thousand more were internally displaced, in addition to those displaced prior to March. Approximately 440,000 refugees crossed the border to Albania

Albania

and 320,000 to FYR Macedonia. , while Bosnia and Herzegovina

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Bosnia and Herzegovina , sometimes called Bosnia-Herzegovina or simply Bosnia, is a country in Southern Europe, on the Balkan Peninsula. Bordered by Croatia to the north, west and south, Serbia to the east, and Montenegro to the southeast, Bosnia and Herzegovina is almost landlocked, except for the...

received more than 30,000. A key point in the arguments against the existence of Operation horseshoe is that Yugoslavia itself hosted around 70,000 Albanian refugees

Presiding Judge Iain Bonomy was imposing sentence said that "deliberate actions of these forces during the campaign

Military campaign

In the military sciences, the term military campaign applies to large scale, long duration, significant military strategy plan incorporating a series of inter-related military operations or battles forming a distinct part of a larger conflict often called a war...

provoked the departure of at least 700,000 ethnic Albanians from Kosovo in the short period from late March to early June 1999."

Destruction of settlements

Yugoslav armed forces indiscriminately attacking Kosovo Albanian village

Village

A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet with the population ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand , Though often located in rural areas, the term urban village is also applied to certain urban neighbourhoods, such as the West Village in Manhattan, New...

s. Police and military forces partially or completely had destroyed thousands of Albanian villages in Kosovo by burning or shell

Shell (projectile)

A shell is a payload-carrying projectile, which, as opposed to shot, contains an explosive or other filling, though modern usage sometimes includes large solid projectiles properly termed shot . Solid shot may contain a pyrotechnic compound if a tracer or spotting charge is used...

ing. According to the UNHCR survey, nearly 40% of all residential houses in Kosovo were heavily damaged or completely destroyed. Out of a total of 237,842 houses, 45,768 are heavily damaged and 46,414 are destroyed. In particular, city of Peć

Pec

Peć or Pejë is a city and municipality in north-western Kosovo and Metohija - Serbia, and the administrative centre of the homonymous district. Governor of city is Ali Berisha....

was heavily destroyed. More than 80% of the total 5280 houses in the city were heavily damaged (1,590) or destroyed (2,774).

Religious objects also have been mass destroyed. According to the report of the Physicians for Human Rights

Physicians for Human Rights

Physicians for Human Rights was founded in 1986 by a small group of doctors who believed the unique scientific expertise and authority of health professionals could bring human rights violations to light and provide justice for victims...

, there were 155 destroyed mosque

Mosque

A mosque is a place of worship for followers of Islam. The word is likely to have entered the English language through French , from Portuguese , from Spanish , and from Berber , ultimately originating in — . The Arabic word masjid literally means a place of prostration...

s in Kosovo in August 1999 based on claims from refugees.

Identity cleansing

Identity cleansing is defined as "confiscation of personal identification, passports, and other such documents in order to make it difficult or impossible for those driven out to return".-Kosovo Albanians example:...

was a strategy allegedly employed by the government of Yugoslavia

Yugoslavia

Yugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....

during the Kosovo crisis of the late 1990s

Kosovo War

. Identity cleansing is defined as "confiscation of personal identification, passports, and other such documents to make it difficult or impossible for those driven out to return".

Expelled Kosovar Albanians claimed that they were systematically stripped of identity and property documents including passport

Passport

A passport is a document, issued by a national government, which certifies, for the purpose of international travel, the identity and nationality of its holder. The elements of identity are name, date of birth, sex, and place of birth....

s, land titles, automobile license plates, identity cards and other documents. In conjunction with the policy of expelling ethnic Albanians from the province, the Yugoslav forces would confiscate all documents that indicated the identity of those being expelled. Physicians for Human Rights

Physicians for Human Rights

reports that nearly 60% of respondents to its survey observed Serbian forces removing or destroying personal identification documents. Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch

also documented the common practice of "identity cleansing": refugees expelled toward Albania

Albania

were frequently stripped of their identity documents and forced to remove the license plates from their vehicles. This criminal practice suggesting the government

Government

Government refers to the legislators, administrators, and arbitrators in the administrative bureaucracy who control a state at a given time, and to the system of government by which they are organized...

was trying to block their return.

In addition to confiscating the relevant documents from their holders, efforts were also made to destroy any actual birth records (and other archives) which were maintained by governmental agencies, so as to make the "cleansing" complete (this latter tactic sometimes being referred to as archival cleansing).

This practice received worldwide condemnation, and evidence of it has been brought at the war crime

War crime

War crimes are serious violations of the laws applicable in armed conflict giving rise to individual criminal responsibility...

s trials held at The Hague

The Hague

Massacres of civilians

Incomplete list of massacres:

Suva Reka massacre
Suva Reka massacre
The Suva Reka massacre was the mass murder of Albanian civilians committed by Serbian police forces on 26 March 1999 in Suva Reka, Kosovo, during the NATO bombings of Yugoslavia....

— 48 Albanian civilians victims, among them many children.
Operation Račak — 45 Albanians were murdered by Serb special forces. This is controversial, with many believing that those killed were KLA fighters who were later moved to give the appearance of a massacre. During the trial of Slobodan Milosevic, all charges relating to Račak were dropped due to a lack of evidence to prove that the incident was a massacre.

Podujevo massacre
Podujevo massacre
The Podujevo massacre is the name generally used to refer to the killing of 19 Kosovo Albanian civilians, all women and children, committed by Serbian paramilitary forces in March 1999 during the Kosovo war....

– 19 Albanian civilians, including women, children and the elderly, killed by Serb paramilitary forces.
Massacre at Velika Kruša — according to the Court, Serbian special police units
SAJ (Special Anti-terrorist Unit)
The Special Anti-terrorist Unit is a special operations and tactical police unit in Serbia.-History:The SAJ was formed in the former Yugoslavia, due to the increasing phenomenon of terrorism in Europe that was occurring at the time from such groups as: IRA, ETA, Red Army Faction and the Red Brigade...

murdered 42 persons. There were also allegations of mass raped.
Izbica massacre
Izbica massacre
The Izbica massacre was one of the largest massacres of the Kosovo conflict 1999. Serb paramilitary and military forces killed 146 Kosovo Albanians of all ages in the village of Izbica, in the Drenica region of central Kosovo on 28 March 1999.- Background :...

— Serbian forces killed about 146 Albanian civilians.
Drenica massacre — there were 29 identified corpses of massacre, committed by Serbian law enforcement forces
Law enforcement in Serbia
Law enforcement in Serbia is the primary responsibility of the Serbian Police, which is subordinate to the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The ministry is responsible for all local and national law enforcement services in Serbia...

.
Gornje Obrinje massacre
Gornje Obrinje massacre
The Gornje Obrinje massacre is the killing of 21 ethnic Albanians reportedly committed by Serbian forces in the central Kosovo village of Gornje Obrinje on 26 September 1998, during the Kosovo war....

– 18 bodies were found, but more people were slaughtered.
Cuska massacre
Cuska massacre
The Cuska massacre is the name generally used to refer to the mass killing of 48 Kosovo Albanian civilians, all men and boys, committed by the Yugoslav army, police, paramilitary and Serb volunteers from Bosnia in May 1999, during the Kosovo war...

— 41 known victims.
Bela Crkva massacre — 62 known victims
Meja massacre – at least 300 killed by Serbian police and paramilitary forces.
Orahovac massacre — from 50 to more than 200 ethnic Albanian civilians victims
Dubrava Prison massacre — Serbian prison guards killed more than 70 Albanian prisoners.
Poklek massacre – 17 April 1999 – at least 47 people were forced into one room and systematically gunned down by Serbian forces. The precise number of dead is unknown, although it is certain that 23 children under the age of fifteen were killed in the massacre.
Vučitrn massacre
Vučitrn massacre
The Vučitrn massacre was mass killing of Kosovo Albanian refugees near Vučitrn, during the Kosovo conflict on May 2 1999.A column of about 1,000 refugees were travelling in a convoy of about 100 tractors, who were fleeing fighting between the KLA and Serbian forces east of Vucitrn. Serbian Police...

– more than 100 Kosovo refugees killed by Serbian Police.

Cover-up

Soon after NATO started bombing FR Yugoslavia, Slobodan Milosevic

Slobodan Milošević

allegedly ordered that all bodies in Kosovo that could be of interest for The Hague Tribunal should be removed. According to statements, the Army has been systematically carrying corpses of Albanians in the Trepča Mines

Trepca Mines

The Trepča Mines was a huge industrial complex in Serbia, located in the Kosovska Mitrovica Municipality.With up to 23,000 employees, Trepča was once one of the biggest companies in socialist Yugoslavia. In the 1930s, a British company gained the rights to exploit the Stari Trg mine close to...

near Kosovska Mitrovica

Kosovska Mitrovica

Kosovska Mitrovica , is a city and municipality in northern Kosovo. It is the administrative centre of the homonymous district....

, where they were burn

Burn

A burn is an injury to flesh caused by heat, electricity, chemicals, light, radiation, or friction.Burn may also refer to:*Combustion*Burn , type of watercourses so named in Scotland and north-eastern England...

ed. Thus, according to one source, between 1,200 and 1,500 bodies

Human body

The human body is the entire structure of a human organism, and consists of a head, neck, torso, two arms and two legs.By the time the human reaches adulthood, the body consists of close to 100 trillion cells, the basic unit of life...

were destroyed in the Trepča. However, these allegations surround the Trepca mines turned out to be false.

However, some corpses of Kosovo Albanians were transported into central Serbia

Central Serbia

Central Serbia , also referred to as Serbia proper , was the region of Serbia from 1945 to 2009. It included central parts of Serbia outside of the autonomous provinces of Kosovo and Vojvodina. The region of Central Serbia was not an administrative division of Serbia as such; it was under the...

. Some of the murdered Albanians were buried in mass graves around Belgrade

Belgrade

.

In May 2001 the Serbian government announced that a truck

Truck

A truck or lorry is a motor vehicle designed to transport cargo. Trucks vary greatly in size, power, and configuration, with the smallest being mechanically similar to an automobile...

full of corpses of Albanians (86 bodies) were thrown into the river Danube

Danube

The Danube is a river in the Central Europe and the Europe's second longest river after the Volga. It is classified as an international waterway....

during the Kosovo war. After four months of excavations, Serbian officials located at least seven mass graves and some 430 bodies (including women and children) in Serbia outside of Kosovo province. Those sites include graves at Batajnica

Batajnica

Batajnica is an suburban neighborhood of Belgrade, the capital of Serbia. It is located in Belgrade's municipality of Zemun.-Name:...

near Belgrade, at Petrovo Selo in eastern Serbia and near Perućac

Perucac

Perućac is a village in western Serbia in the immediate proximity of the border with Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is situated near the 346 km-long Drina River, which constitutes the natural border between Serbia and Bosnia....

Dam in western Serbia. So far, about 800 remains of Albanians killed and buried in mass graves in Serbia were exhumed and returned to families. Most bodies were discovered in or near police bases where Serbian elite police units were stationed and trained in clandestine operations.

As a witness in the trial of eight police officers for war crimes against Albanian civilians during the Suva Reka massacre

Suva Reka massacre

The Suva Reka massacre was the mass murder of Albanian civilians committed by Serbian police forces on 26 March 1999 in Suva Reka, Kosovo, during the NATO bombings of Yugoslavia....

, Dragan Karleuša, the investigator of the Ministry of Interior of Serbia, testified that in Serbia there are more graves

Grave (burial)

A grave is a location where a dead body is buried. Graves are usually located in special areas set aside for the purpose of burial, such as graveyards or cemeteries....

.

The investigator Dragan Karleusa noticed "why would they remove bodies in this way if the people had died normally," concluding that they didn't die normally. Campaign to clean up bodies was, in fact, a cover-up for a terrible crime.

Other

Summary killings of prominent ethnic Albanian leaders and intellectuals also have been reported (including Bajram Kelmendi

Bajram Kelmendi

Bajram Kelmendi was a Kosovan lawyer and public figure.He was born near Peć, Kosovo. At age of eighteen, he was imprisoned for eighteen months for criticizing the forced expulsion of Albanians to Turkey...

NATO

Aggressive war

Many international lawyers have stated that Nato's attack on Yugoslavia was illegal as first it was done without the UN Security council's consent and second; according to the UN Charter, all aggressive wars against sovereign states are illegal with the exception of if the war is in self defense.

Use of cluster bombs

Throughout the Nato bombing of Yugoslavia, Cluster bomb

Cluster bomb

A cluster munition is a form of air-dropped or ground-launched explosive weapon that releases or ejects smaller sub-munitions. Commonly, this is a cluster bomb that ejects explosive bomblets that are designed to kill enemy personnel and destroy vehicles...

s were used widely throughout Yugoslavia, causing many civilian casualties. Some of the bombs are still active more than 10 years later. However, the use of cluster bombs was not banned by international law until the Convention on Cluster Munitions

Convention on Cluster Munitions

The Convention on Cluster Munitions is an international treaty that prohibits the use, transfer and stockpile of cluster bombs, a type of explosive weapon which scatters submunitions over an area. The convention was adopted on 2008 in Dublin, and was opened for signature on 2008 in Oslo...

entered into force and became binding international law upon ratifying states on 1 August 2010.

Use of depleted uranium

Throughout Nato's bombing campaign, depleted uranium

Depleted uranium

Depleted uranium is uranium with a lower content of the fissile isotope U-235 than natural uranium . Uses of DU take advantage of its very high density of 19.1 g/cm3...

ammunition was dropped on Yugoslavia in many areas.
In 2001, Carla Del Ponte

Carla Del Ponte

Carla Del Ponte is a former Chief Prosecutor of two United Nations international criminal law tribunals. A former Swiss attorney general, she was appointed prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in August...

, then the chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

, said that NATO's use of depleted uranium

Depleted uranium

Depleted uranium is uranium with a lower content of the fissile isotope U-235 than natural uranium . Uses of DU take advantage of its very high density of 19.1 g/cm3...

in former Yugoslavia could be investigated as a possible war crime. Louise Arbour, Del Ponte's predecessor as chief prosecutor, had created a small, internal committee, made up of staff lawyers, to assess the allegation. Their findings, that were accepted and endorsed by Del Ponte, concluded that:

Bombing of civilian targets

Nato has been accused of targeting civilian targets indiscriminately amongst infrastructure destroyed, were 33 Clinics and hospitals, 55 Road and Rail Bridges, 6 Civilian airports, 24 transmitters, 10 TV and radio stations, and a staggering 340 schools. In comparison, only 14 tanks were destroyed by Nato bombs.

Civilian casualties

The Serbian government and a number of international pressure groups (e.g. Amnesty International

Amnesty International

Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...

) claimed that NATO had carried out war crimes by bombing civilians. In total the number of civilian casualties caused by the NATO bombing stood at 2500, while the military and police casualties stood at only 40% of that number at only 1031.

Incomplete list of civilian casualties:

Grdelica train bombing
Grdelica train bombing
The Grdelica train bombing occurred on 12 April 1999 , when two missiles fired by NATO aircraft hit a passenger train while it was passing across a railway bridge over the Južna Morava river at Grdelica gorge, some south of Belgrade in Serbia...
NATO bombing of Albanian refugees near Đakovica
NATO bombing of the Radio Television of Serbia headquarters
Lužane bus bombing
Lužane bus bombing
The Lužane bus bombing occurred on May 1, 1999 during the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, when NATO missiles targeting a bridge in Kosovo hit a bus. The bus was hit on the Lužane north of Pristina. Approximately 39 people were killed. One section plunged off the bridge into the river below. The bus ...
Cluster bombing of Niš
Cluster bombing of Niš
The Cluster bombing of Niš was an event that occurred on May 7, 1999 during the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. It was the most serious incident involving civilian deaths and the use of cluster bombs. The cluster bombs had been dropped by Dutch F-16s. After the incident the Dutch stopped using cluster...
US bombing of the People's Republic of China embassy in Belgrade
NATO bombing of Albanian refugees near Koriša
NATO bombing of Albanian refugees near Koriša
The Bombing of Albanian refugees near Koriša occurred on May 14, 1999 during the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, when NATO planes struck two convoys of ethnic Albanians trying to flee Kosovo, killing as many as 100 people...

Aftermath

Refugees

An estimated 200,000 Serbs and Roma fled Kosovo after the war. Romani people were also driven out after being harassed by Albanians. The Yugoslav Red Cross had also registered 247,391 mostly Serbian refugees by November.

Killings

According to Human Rights Watch, as "many as one thousand Serbs and Roma have been murdered or have gone missing since 12 June 1999." The notorious Gnjilane Group

Gnjilane Group

Gnjilane Group is the name of a subgroup part of the Kosovo Albanian UÇK . During the Kosovo War, the Gnjilane Group were accused of being the perpetrators of more than 153 physical abuses, of civilian Serbs between June–October 1999 in the town of Gnjilane, Kosovo after the international forces...

was active in Gnjilane, committing brutal crimes and murders against ethnic Serbs during June–October 1999, after the KFOR had arrived.

According to a Serbian government report, in the period from 10 June 1999, to 11 November 2001, when NATO had been in control in Kosovo, 847 people were reported to have been killed and 1,154 kidnapped. This comprised both civilians and security forces personnel.

Organ theft

Carla Del Ponte

, a long-time ICTY chief prosecutor claimed in her book The Hunt: Me and the War Criminals
The Hunt: Me and the War Criminals
The Hunt: Me and the War Criminals is a book written by Carla Del Ponte, published in April 2008. According to Del Ponte she received information saying about 300 non-Albanians were kidnapped and transferred to Albania in 1999 where their organs were extracted...

that there were instances of organ trafficking in 1999. According to the book after the end of the war in 1999, Kosovo Albanians were smuggling organs of between 100 and 300 Serbs and other minorities from the province to Albania

Albania

. The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

and Serbian War Crimes Tribunal are currently investigating these allegations, as numerous witnesses and new materials have recently emerged.

Criminal prosecutions of Serbian leaders before the ICTY

Slobodan Milošević

, along with Milan Milutinović

Milan Milutinovic

Milan Milutinović is a former President of Serbia. He served as Director of the National Library of Serbia , Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to Greece, Yugoslavia's Federal Minister of Foreign Affairs , and as President of Serbia from 1997 until 2002.After his presidential term...

, Nikola Šainović

Nikola Šainovic

Nikola Šainović , born 7 December 1948 in Bor, Serbia, Yugoslavia) is a former Prime Minister of Serbia of Montenegrin descent...

, Dragoljub Ojdanić

Dragoljub Ojdanic

Dragoljub Ojdanić was former Chief of the General Staff and Defence minister of Yugoslavia...

and Vlajko Stojiljković

Vlajko Stojiljkovic

Vlajko Stojiljkovic was Yugoslavia's Minister of Internal Affairs from 1997 until the deposal of Slobodan Milosevic....

were charged by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

(ICTY) with crimes against humanity including murder, forcible population transfer

Population transfer

Population transfer is the movement of a large group of people from one region to another by state policy or international authority, most frequently on the basis of ethnicity or religion...

, deportation

Deportation

Deportation means the expulsion of a person or group of people from a place or country. Today it often refers to the expulsion of foreign nationals whereas the expulsion of nationals is called banishment, exile, or penal transportation...

and "persecution

Persecution

on political, racial or religious grounds". Further indictments were leveled in October 2003 against former armed forces chief of staff Nebojša Pavković

Nebojša Pavkovic

Nebojša Pavković was Chief of the General Staff of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia....

, former army corps commander Vladimir Lazarević, former police official Vlastimir Đorđević and the current head of Serbia's public security, Sreten Lukić

Sreten Lukić

Sreten Lukić, born on 28 March 1955 in Višegrad, Bosnia and Herzegovina, is the former head of the Serbian police in Kosovo during the 1998-99 Kosovo and subsequently Serbian deputy interior minister from 2001 to 2004...

. All were indicted for crimes against humanity and violations of the laws or customs of war. Milosevic died in ICTY custody before sentencing.

The Court has pronounced the following verdicts:

Milan Milutinovic
Milan Milutinovic
Milan Milutinović is a former President of Serbia. He served as Director of the National Library of Serbia , Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to Greece, Yugoslavia's Federal Minister of Foreign Affairs , and as President of Serbia from 1997 until 2002.After his presidential term...

, former President of the Republic of Serbia and Yugoslav Foreign Minister, acquitted.
Nikola Sainovic
Nikola Šainovic
Nikola Šainović , born 7 December 1948 in Bor, Serbia, Yugoslavia) is a former Prime Minister of Serbia of Montenegrin descent...

, Yugoslav Deputy Prime Minister, guilty on all counts, sentenced to 22 years in prison.
Dragoljub Ojdanic
Dragoljub Ojdanic
Dragoljub Ojdanić was former Chief of the General Staff and Defence minister of Yugoslavia...

, Chief of General Staff of the VJ, guilty to two counts, sentenced to 15 years in prison.
Nebojsa Pavkovic
Nebojša Pavkovic
Nebojša Pavković was Chief of the General Staff of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia....

, commander of Third Army, guilty on all counts, sentenced to 22 years in prison.
Vladimir Lazarevic, commander of the Pristina Corps VJ, guilty of two counts, sentenced to 15 years in prison.
Sreten Lukic
Sreten Lukić
Sreten Lukić, born on 28 March 1955 in Višegrad, Bosnia and Herzegovina, is the former head of the Serbian police in Kosovo during the 1998-99 Kosovo and subsequently Serbian deputy interior minister from 2001 to 2004...

, Chief of Staff of the Serbian police, guilty on all counts, sentenced to 22 years in prison.
Vlastimir Đorđević, Chief of the Public Security Department of Serbia's Ministry of Internal Affairs, guilty of five counts, including crimes against humanity and war crimes, and sentenced to 27 years in prison.

Nikola Sainovic, Nebojsa Pavkovic and Sreten Lukic were convicted as members of the joint criminal enterprise

Joint Criminal Enterprise

, while others are convicted of aiding and abetting crimes.

War crimes prosecutions have also been carried out in Yugoslavia. Yugoslav soldier Ivan Nikolić was found guilty in 2002 of war crimes in the deaths of two civilians in Kosovo.

Indictments to KLA leaders

The ICTY also leveled indictments against KLA members Fatmir Limaj

Fatmir Limaj

Fatmir Limaj is a politician from Kosovo. He is a member of the Democratic Party of Kosovo and is considered to be Hashim Thaçi's right hand and close political partner...

, Haradin Bala

Haradin Bala

Haradin Bala is an Albanian-Kosovar commander of the Kosovo Liberation Army , found guilty of crimes against humanity and violations of the customs of war by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia...

, Isak Musliu

Isak Musliu

Isak Musliu was charged by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia with a series of beatings and murders in a Kosovo Liberation Army prison camp in a family compound in Lapušnik to deal with Serbs and suspected Albanians opposed to the KLA between May and July 1998 during...

and Agim Murtezi, indicted for crimes against humanity. They were arrested on February 17–18, 2003. Charges were soon dropped against Agim Murtezi as a case of mistaken identity, whereas Fatmir Limaj was acquitted of all charges on 30 November 2005 and released. The charges were in relation to the prison camp run by the defendants at Lapušnik

Llapushnik prison camp

Lapušnik or Llapushnik prison camp was a detention camp near the city of Glogovac in central Kosovo during the Kosovo war, early 1998, held by the Kosovo Liberation Army for the intimidation, imprisonment, violence and murder of Serbs and perceived Albanian collaborators who refused to cooperate...

between May and July 1998.

On March 2005, a U.N. tribunal indicted Kosovo Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj

Ramush Haradinaj

Ramush Haradinaj is a former leader of the Kosovo Liberation Army and former prime minister of Kosovo. He leads the Alliance for the Future of Kosovo and is among former KLA officers charged of war crimes during the 1999 Kosovo War by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia...

for war crimes against the Serbs, on 8 March he tendered his resignation. Haradinaj, an ethnic Albanian, was a former commander who led units of the Kosovo Liberation Army and was appointed Prime Minister after winning an election of 72 votes to three in the Kosovo's Parliament in December 2004. Haradinaj was acquitted on all counts, but was recalled due to witness intimidation and faces a retrial.

External links

Kosovo War Crimes Chronology
Human Rights in Kosovo: As Seen, As Told, 1999 (OSCE report)
Under Orders: War Crimes in Kosovo (Human Right Watch report)
Report of the UN Secretary-General, 31 January 1999
Kosovo: Ethnic Cleansing (Michigan State University)
Kosovo: Rape as a Weapon of "Ethnic Cleansing"
Erasing History: Ethnic Cleansing in Kosovo (Report released by the U.S. Department of State)
ICTY: Indictment of Milutinović et al., "Kosovo", 5 September 2002
Photographic Evidence of Kosovo Genocide and Conflict
Human Right Watch Photo Gallery

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Background

KLA war crimes

Kidnappings and summary executions

Massacres

Destruction of settlements, churches and cemeteries

Ethnic cleansing

Use of child soldiers

Concentration camps

Organ theft

Yugoslav war crimes

Persecution and deportations

Destruction of settlements

Identity cleansing

Massacres of civilians

Cover-up

Other

NATO

Aggressive war

Use of cluster bombs

Use of depleted uranium

Bombing of civilian targets

Civilian casualties

Aftermath

Refugees

Killings

Organ theft

Criminal prosecutions of Serbian leaders before the ICTY

Indictments to KLA leaders

See also

External links